When I found out I was having twins, of course my mom was on the hook to make me some crocheted blankets. After finding out it was a boy and a girl, we looked through patterns and I immediately was drawn to this one (Monkey Business designed by Jessi Martin, pattern purchased at Annie's Attic). We are thrilled with how they turned out!

My sister-in-law is having a baby girl and her baby shower will be sometime in October. I wanted to make and decorate cupcakes for the shower but I've never been very good at it so I felt I needed at least one practice run. I found a nice idea online (http://www.wilton.com/idea/Cupcake-Corsages) and wanted to make cupcakes like these! So I bought some pastel fondant and all the accessories (fondant cutters: leaves and flowers, a fondant rolling mat, a fondant roller with thickness sizing rings) and gave it a whirl. I'm pretty pleased overall, but for the real deal I'll probably make my own fondant and use brighter colors like in the link that gave me the idea. Also in the link, they used "sparkling sugar" on the smaller flowers which I intend to use as well, gives it a nice texture.

This is yet another baby quilt I have recently made and it was my first attempt at a more traditional-style quilt. The colors are slightly off in the lighting, but it is various hues of blues and greens.

I made these for a coworker to match a quilt (I had lots of leftover fabric). I found these peepee teepees on one of my favorite websites, uncommongoods.com (link to the item is below). These are pretty simple to make really, and they were a big hit at the shower. Great idea for baby boys.

I made this quilt (my third completed quilt) for my big brother as a 30th birthday / housewarming gift. He described his favorite colors to me as "blue and/or Dallas Cowboy's colors." So naturally, blue and gray came to mind. This was done 100% by hand so it took me about 3 months. It was intended to be a Christmas gift but ended up being a late birthday gift (his birthday is in January). I like to call it a stacked stone pattern. If I make another with a similar pattern, I will make much thicker layers because all the stitching took forever!

I already posted my kitchen makeover (https://www.craftster.org/forum/index.php?topic=277791.0) and we did something similar here in the bathroom. What we have done so far is again remove the busy wallpaper, texture and paint the walls, and we removed the CARPET that was in the bathroom and tiled the whole area. Total cost is probably around $900 which included the purchase price of a tile saw and a Kohler "comfort height" toilet - our splurge! I know $900 is not cheap, but considering that bathrooms can easily exceed several thousand, I consider this in the realm of low-budget for bathrooms.

New mirrors and lights for the vanity.

Paint makes ALL the difference in the world.

Turquoise accessories/wall art.

We LOVE this toilet!

Should I paint the cabinets high-gloss white like the trim? I didn't right away because I got lazy, but now I'm used to the oak cabinets with the "mississippi mud" walls and I'm not sure if the white would overpower/sterilize the look.

A few months ago, I found out that a coworker was pregnant. I wanted to make a quilt for the baby, so I took her input to design this quilt. I realize the colors are not typical for a baby quilt, but they are some of her favorite colors and are fairly gender-neutral. Not long after finding out my coworker was pregnant, I found out that my cousin was pregnant too. I decided to make two identical quilts. Making identical quilts made it simple; I cut the pieces for both quilts at the same time. Both were completely hand-stitched. I now identify myself as a quilter and I can't wait to make more.

Quilt #1

Quilt #2

And my dog loves the quilts. He loved laying on both of them as I was making them.

When we purchased our house over a year ago, the very first project we tackled was the kitchen makeover. We took down the wallpaper, textured the walls, painted the cabinets, and added cabinet hardware and updated a few appliances. Not including the appliances and light fixtures (which came much later), we spent under $100. The hardware was on sale and paint and texture is not that expensive, but the impact is dramatic. We are proud that our kitchen does not look like any others in the neighborhood anymore.

The one "before" picture I could find; typical builder-grade cabinets with busy wallpaper.

"After" that almost matches the above angle.

Another angle

My little breakfast area with the neat counter-height table.

Excuse the mess on the counter, but I really like this angle with the aquarium and the wine and pilsner glasses.

I've visited Craftster much in the past but this is my first post. My sister-in-law's birthday was coming up and she'd been hinting to me that she wanted something that I've painted, so I got to thinking. She likes dark colors and Japanese themes...leather is dark. So I figured I'd take some leather (ended up with faux leather of course), cut it into strips, and weave it across a frame. Then I got the bright idea to paint it. I thought it turned out pretty cool. She was super excited and is going to hang them above her bed in place of the headboard she doesn't have.

Ingredients (2' x 2' frames made from 1" x 2" wood and some wood glue and screws, 1.5 yards of faux leather, the most expensive part of the project at $29.99/yd for the good-looking stuff, and a dog to get in your way and keep you laughing. I also used a staple gun to fix the faux leather to the frames):http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b3/bliss2187/Crafts/DSCF0457.jpg

I also put the little hanging strips on the backs of them. I had considered putting black felt across the back to hide the staples and edges of the strips but I ran out of time and figured the sister-in-law wouldn't care, but it would certainly make it look more professional.